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Tony Hawk Spies a Younger, Shirtless Version of Himself in V.F.'s Lobby

You know the feeling when your ex-girlfriend comes over, goes to Google something, and her own name pops up in the URL bar? Well, that sort of happened to Vanity Fair yesterday when pro-skateboarder Tony Hawk came to our office and noticed a shirtless picture of himself hanging in the lobby; the photograph was shot by Jonas Karlsson for *V.F.’*s June 2001 issue. Hawk, also known as "Birdman," is to skateboarding what Michael Jordan is to basketball, Lance Armstrong to biking, and Bernie Madoff to fraud. In other words, there's no one even comparable in terms of skill, prominence, and success. Since busting the first "900"—two-and-a-half rotations—in 1999's X-Games, Hawk has reached near-mythic status. This week he debuts the 10th version of his popular video game, Ride, but this time he has something a little different planned: instead of a game controller, Hawk created a self-contained skateboard capable of ollieng and kickflipping until your downstairs neighbors start hitting the ceiling with their broom.

Hawk stopped by our offices to discuss John Madden's ability to play Ride, the Tony Hawk Foundation, and the future of skating. For any wannabe New York City skaters, Hawk had good things to say about the yet-to-open Chelsea Piers skatepark, which was mapped out by the same designer that created the park in Hawk's Southern California backyard. After the interview, Hawk was off on a red-eye to Paris for a Quiksilver demo that has him skating Europe's largest ramp, constructed in the Grand Palais. Dude, they built a ramp in the Grand Palais? No way.VF Daily: As far as namesake video games go, it's really just you and Madden. Do you think you're better at Madden, or Madden would be better at * Ride*?

Tony Hawk: I don't play Madden, so I wouldn't be very good at it.

So Madden might be better at skating?

Perhaps, yeah. I like to think that a guy like Madden could get on the board and actually do some tricks. We've seen moms get on it and start doing tricks immediately.

Your new video game utilizes a wireless skateboard peripheral with the gamer actually standing on it. How did that come about?

A couple years ago, I had the idea that it was time to do something with a wireless board. And so we set off to do it. To be honest, it turned out much better than I thought. I didn't really think it would be so responsive with how the board moves. There's so much technology in it. It knows every direction that you twist or kick it. And these are infrared sensors, so if your hands are nearby, it knows if your character is trying to grab. I hadn't really thought that far ahead.

At the Crunch Fitness near my apartment, they were selling me on this snowboard workout game where you get on the board, but still have to hold a control. You're saying it'll be way better than that?

Yeah, I think the problem with that is people have tried to create controllers for existing games and no one has created a game based on a controller. We started the process in that order—we actually made the component and then figured out how to make the game around it.

You must've gone though a million demos before you decided on the current board.

We went through probably five or six incarnations of the board. Just testing anything and everything. Once we discovered that if you stick two accelerometers in the board, which basically is like having two iPhones in there, it knows when it's pointing forward. Then we knew we were close.

Do actual skaters like the game?

Yeah, for the most part. A lot of them get on it and try to skate on it. Those moves are a little too exaggerated for the game, and to be honest, they work, but you're not going to get the best scores that way. There's a learning curve on how to turn. It's almost like when you're playing a car-racing game and you end up steering too tightly around corners, but you learn that pretty quickly.

How are New Yorkers going to react to your game with the neighbor's kid skateboarding on the floor above?

[Laughs.] I hadn't really thought about that. I just hope they put a rug or they have a carpet.

I think the biggest misconception is people who hear about the foundation think, "Oh, I live in an area, it doesn't have a skatepark. You should build me a skatepark." And the idea is that we're empowering people that have already taken it upon themselves to do something about it. We want you to be involved. We want you to take pride in your community and to help you do that, we're not going to waive a magic wand and say, "You need a skatepark. Here you go."

You actively design each park?

Basically, we get all the design submissions, and I try to pore over every one and just give feedback and try to make it friendlier for a crowd and all skill levels.

Do you have a favorite park that you contributed to?

It's hard to say. I really like that we helped build a park in Compton, because Compton's such an iconic city and representative of low-income and inner-city challenges for the youth. So, the park is not the best, but it's really good for its size. When we say we do parks in low-income areas, that's such a broad spectrum, but when you say we did a park in Compton or in Watts, that means a lot to people.

Are there a lot of skaters in Compton?

Yeah! I think this will help, for sure. People are coming from all over to skate now. Skating doesn't favor any sort of income level or area. It's just that in a place like Compton, they didn't have a facility. They didn't have support if you chose to skate.

Back in 1999, you landed the Holy Grail of skating tricks with a 900 at the X-Games. What's next?

That's really all a matter of opinion. There are plenty of solid street guys out there who don't care how far you spin on a vert-ramp. But there are a lot of things being invented and developed and tested right now that are incredible and are milestones in our sport.

Like what?

There's a new video with Bob Burnquist doing stuff on the mega-ramp that is just insane. He does a 360-flip to a 50-50 on this rail—that's a 40-foot gap, and it's 10 feet high. It's stuff we never dreamed of.